Episode 4: Alissa

AlissaAge: 24Location: MichiganAddicted to: GamblingAddiction Trigger: Accident caused facial disfigurement.What’s memorable: Lives off of her boyfriend, doesn’t work, just loses at gambling day after day in hopes of hitting a jackpot.

Official synopsis: Alissa’s parents and friends try to save her from her gambling addiction. She has lost over $30,000 on 25-cent slots. Her boyfriend has three jobs and makes all of the money, while Alissa gambles it away.

Discussion

5 Responses to “Episode 4: Alissa”

I can’t imagine being in a car wreck so bad that the doctor needed old pics to reconstruct my face! I could see how she’d be paranoid that she didn’t look like her old self because she didn’t. She looked very close and looked good, and probably as close as the doctors could get to looking like her old self but I know I would notice the differences. I am a rape victim and feel like I have an old self and a new self internally which is hard and I will compare my new self to my old self looking from a negative view. But she literally has an old and new self to compare to. It’s a vicious cycle! I hope she is ok now!

It’s been so long since I’ve seen this episode I wondered what ever happened to this girl?? Looked like she was at one of the casinos in Detroit, I used to go once in a while years ago. Makes me wonder where in Michigan she’s from. Anyone have an update or know if she quit gambling?

I was reading the book “The Dead Travel Fast” by Eric Nuzum. In it, he investigates the history of vampires. It’s a fact-based book but he encounters different groups of people in his research and when he took a trip to Transylvania, Alissa and her boyfriend Adam were on the trip, only when he talks about them in the book, he says their names are Elaina and Brad. I don’t know how much of the info about her in the book was true or what besides her name was changed to prevent a lawsuit, but he describes her as a vegan PETA supporter who lived on nothing but bad pizza, Doritos, and Pepsi during the trip. She and her boyfriend were always late and she was basically paranoid that everyone was talking about her. Nuzum even describes the intervention episode in the book. If you ever get the chance, read it, not only because the whole book is great but because the chapter dealing with the Transylvania trip is insane.